“Wow… I see now. Wow.” “…Is that impressive to you? Really?” Hoshi stuck the few remaining items into the bags, looking away from me like she wanted to hide something. She shut her eyes. “I just thought…you must be smart to come up with that.” Her eyes sprang open, and she turned to me like she wanted to say something, light reflecting in the corners of her eyes. I thought maybe what I’d said hadn’t come out right, and I tried to think of a better way to say it, but I couldn’t. You have to be smart to know the right way to say things. I admired my sister for always having the words. “Well, anyway,” Hoshi said with resignation. She stuffed the last thing, a daikon radish, in a bag. “Want me to carry that?” “Naw, but thanks,” she replied, mimicking the soft intonation of my dialect. I put my hands on my hips and walked out of the store after her. I felt like something was pulling at the backs of my knees annoyingly… Was I upset Hoshi had mimicked me? Nobody had ever tried to copy anything I did before… It felt weird. We went back the same way, in the same heat as before. The only difference was the shopping bags swaying as we walked, separating me and Hoshi. I heard a railway crossing alarm in the distance. The crossing we’d gone over on the way to the supermarket came to my mind. For some reason, the rhythmic alarm made me feel uneasy, like I had to hurry back home. I wondered if something had happened in the past that made me feel that way, but all my memories were of staring at the ground, of asphalt, dirt roads, puddles, dirty, worn-out shoes… Which reminded me I should buy new ones so I wouldn’t embarrass my sister standing next to her. Whatever I thought about, my thoughts always got sidetracked by my sister. We turned from the main road to a narrow lane, and I saw the railway crossing from before. Past the crossing was…the home I was walking back to. Not mine. My classmate’s. Thinking about it, why was I walking home to a place that wasn’t mine like it was normal? Hoshi was weird, too, to accept that. Hoshi’s shopping bags swayed forward and backward, then paused. I stopped abruptly, moving my forward foot back before it touched the ground. Hoshi pointed at a building we were about to pass by. “Want to go in?” she asked cautiously. Three steps after the railway crossing, I steeled myself to make sure my voice wouldn’t betray excitement. I summoned strength into my wrists and the depths of my heart, speaking to tamp down those parts of my body that I’d strained. “Want to go in?” I asked, erupting in sweat that had nothing to do with the summer heat. I didn’t want to just keep walking back home…because that would be the end of things. The rest of the day would be the same as always. Doing the same things over and over again hoping for some sort of change was foolish. Instead, I plunged into the deep, gathering my courage to ask Mizuike if she’d make a stop with me on the way home. “Go in?” Mizuike leaned forward toward the place I had pointed out, brushing hair off her face. I wondered how to interpret her question. Was she hinting she thought I was being ridiculous, or simply unsure what sort of place it was? Umi Mizuike didn’t hide any meaning in between the lines, I thought, and when I caught her gaze, the look in her dark eyes confirmed she simply didn’t understand where I wanted to take her. “It’s a teahouse.” How had she reached her age without ever having been to a teahouse? She was shockingly ignorant of things I would have assumed were totally basic. Mizuike touched her chin, mouthing “teahouse.” “A place you go to drink tea?” “Pretty much.” What even is this conversation? Mizuike’s gaze drifted to the side. “Like doutoru…” “Doutoru? What?” It was my turn to draw a blank. “I didn’t bring my wallet. Is it okay if I just sit with you?” She waved her hands as if to prove she hadn’t brought anything with her. I was about to tell her I’d treat her, but I hesitated. I didn’t want to have Mizuike sponging off me. On the other hand, I did want her to like me, and I didn’t see anything wrong with using money to win some points with her. That was how that woman did it. Even if the amount of money she spent on Mizuike was on a vastly different scale, why shouldn’t I do the same? Still, something inside me resisted, maybe because I’d classified that woman as a bad person. If I started acting like her, I might turn into a bad person too, eventually. Would that bother me, though? I wasn’t sure. “I’ll pay now for both of us, and you can pay me back later.” “Oh, you can do it that way, too… Makes sense.” She seemed to be okay with it. Good. Nobody would be in anyone’s debt. We’d be on equal footing. There’d be no bias. I’d passed by that teahouse many times, but I’d never been inside before. The store entrance curtain had “Ice” written in calligraphy on it, which you’d assume was a seasonal design advertising shaved ice, but I knew they had those curtains year-round. Did they serve shaved ice during winter, too? No idea. The teahouse was pretty small, with two tables and a few counter seats. It felt like a grotto that’d been carved out at the base of this little building. There were sharp angles everywhere like the corners of a block of cheese. Fortunately, the air-conditioning was working exceedingly well in that small store. That was enough to make me feel optimistic. “Welcome,” an elderly man said to us from behind the counter, standing up quickly. It seemed he hadn’t been expecting customers, or at least customers like us. The man must have been drinking in the summer sun given his deep tan. His hair, tied at the back with a slight wave to it below the hair tie, was strikingly white against his dark skin. His style was something I associated with beach store shopkeepers, not teahouse owners. We could’ve gone to one of the big cafés near the station instead, but it was too much to walk in the summer heat, so this would do. We sat down facing each other. There were no other customers besides us, and the walls were close on all sides. It made me feel strangely pressured. As soon as I set down my grocery bags on the floor, the old man came over. “What can I get you?” “I’ll have…iced coffee, please.” I didn’t normally drink coffee, but one time wouldn’t hurt. Both the old man and I looked at Mizuike. “Could…,” she started, but she closed her mouth and asked after a pause, “Do you have apple juice?” “Yes, we do.” “I’ll have that, please,” she said, looking down at the table. People would probably think she was just being shy, but I knew it was her natural gloom at work. I could almost believe I was special to her, since she maintained eye contact with me in some of our conversations. My heart would soar, buoyant with joy. It didn’t take much for my mood to swing dramatically up or down. Being in love was an energy-intensive state, I had observed. “So you like apple juice?” “It’s sweet.” What a talker. She did smile as she spoke, though, which was unusual. “Okay, no. I love it.” “…Cool.” My stupid brain took her smile and the word love out of context. A searing pain flashed through my earlobes as if someone had pricked them and left them bleeding. The teahouse owner brought us glasses of water with ice in them. I picked mine up and swirled it gently in my hand, enjoying the clinking of the ice cubes. I noticed Mizuike was playing with her glass in the same way. Now, I might be accused of not being objective, but I thought when Mizuike was doing it, it looked more childish. It suited her. Mizuike’s uniquely colored eyes glinted faintly in the dim, diffused light, like a treasure glittering at the bottom of the dark depths of the ocean. Those eyes took my breath away and rendered me speechless—not all at once so that I was gasping for air, but slowly easing me into breathlessness. The heat, the clammy sweat, the smells in the air—everything my other senses were picking up was secondary as sight took over. I never used to have amazing concentration, but I could sit there focused solely on Mizuike without ever growing tired. I was spellbound, and my eyesight sharpened. Suddenly, something moved in the corner of my vision. I didn’t know how to react when my eyes met those of a woman standing outside, voyeuristically peering into the teahouse through the window in the door. She smiled, as if pleased I’d seen her, and opened the door. I didn’t know her. She might have been around the same age as my mom, but unlike my mom, she had this aura of energy and robustness. Like she was bursting with life, or like no force in the world could make her sit still. “I’ve never seen customers here before!” she proclaimed, beaming. The old man looked up, but instead of greeting her, he sighed heavily. “Well, you certainly aren’t one.” “I’ll have one serving of premium iced caffè latte!” “Try again.” “One premium… Hmm… Caffè… Caffè… One caffè, please!” “Go home.” The old man waved her away like a pesky fly, and the woman walked out of the teahouse, chortling, a bounce in her step. What was that about? On second thought, the woman reminded me of someone…but who? “Sorry about the commotion,” the old man said to us from his seat. “I’ve known her since she was young. I could count on my fingers the times she actually ordered anything to drink here.” “Ah…” That woman’s frenetic, chicken-like energy had overwhelmed Mizuike, who’d shuffled closer to the wall. “There are all sorts of mothers out there,” she said. She was clearly marveling at the difference between the woman and her own mother. “Yeah…,” I said, even though I wouldn’t have made the assumption that the woman was a parent. In the end, I couldn’t figure out who she reminded me of. After that, even though Mizuike and I looked at each other a few times, we didn’t talk. I couldn’t think of anything to talk about, so instead of trying to force conversation, I sat back and enjoyed the cooling breeze from the AC. The only common topic Mizuike and I could discuss was Ms. Chitaira—how ironic that she was our connection. I’d rather not talk at all than talk about her, though. I thought it was nice Mizuike and I could enjoy our time together in silence without it being weird. I chose to appreciate the simple things, like the daily bowl of rice with my dinner. I had to hope Mizuike wasn’t the type of girl who craved meat for every meal. “Thank you for waiting.” The old man brought us the apple juice and coffee. It hadn’t been a long wait, actually. Steam was rising from my cup, while Mizuike’s drink was in a glass with ice cubes floating in it. Then again, of course apple juice would be served with ice. There was no such thing as hot apple juice. Well, there was apple tea, but that was something else. I had this feeling like something wasn’t right, but I got distracted by Mizuike drinking her juice. She held the glass very carefully with her slender hand and took a tiny sip through the straw. Then she licked the corners of her mouth and smiled, her gaze dropping down as if she were looking at something under the table. Next time I went to the supermarket, I should get apple juice. Mizuike’s smile had convinced me it would be money well spent. I put some sugar in my coffee and brought the cup to my lips. The steam and the aroma wafted up to my nose, overwhelming, as I swallowed the throat-burning liquid without even tasting it. Again, I felt like something was amiss. Again, Mizuike took my thoughts off that. “Is coffee really that good?” She sounded like a little kid. Cute. Sometimes she acted like a girl my age, sometimes like a child. Never like a baby, though. She had all these different sides to her, which was one of the reasons she was fascinating to observe. “Want to try some?” I pushed the coffee cup toward her. After a brief pause, she reached for it and pulled it closer. She lifted the cup with utmost caution and slowly brought it to her lips, puckered into a tiny O shape. She looked suspicious, and her face didn’t change after trying it. “It’s hot.” “Well, yeah.” A cloud of steam was rising from the cup… Wait… “And it’s like broth.” “Broth? Oh, I kind of get what you mean.” After the juice, the coffee must have been too rich for Mizuike. She winced from the bitterness—exactly the reaction I had anticipated. She pushed the coffee back to me and looked at her juice glass, then my cup again. She slid her glass toward me a little, then pulled it back. She repeated the motion, and I was puzzled at first what she was doing. Then I realized she wanted to offer me a taste of her drink in return. Reluctantly. It wasn’t a good deal for her to give up a little of the juice she liked in return for a sip of something she’d found disgusting—hence her hesitation. I thought it was funny. “It’s okay, I don’t want any,” I said to put her at ease, motioning for her to go ahead and drink her juice. She put the straw in her mouth and started taking little sips, looking up at me like a small, watchful animal at a watering hole. My drink was too hot to go down so quickly, but I played it cool and sipped at it anyway. That was when I remembered—surely it was iced coffee I had ordered, right? Had the arrival of the crazy chicken woman confused the teahouse owner? I was absorbing both the summer heat and the heat of the coffee into my body. This couldn’t be good for me. Mizuike stopped drinking her juice. “Have this,” she said, offering me her glass with a tiny bit of juice on the bottom among the ice cubes. “…Thanks.” It was a lot for her to give up, and after a long mental battle, too. I wished that battle had been shorter so there’d be more juice left. Anyway, I grasped the straw with my lips. I didn’t get butterflies in my stomach thinking Mizuike’s lips had been on that straw just moments ago. We’d been living together for a while, and we’d shared food utensils before. Come to think of it, we were doing everything backward. Normally—not that I’d ever done it normally—you fell in love with someone, and you moved in together only after going steady. That’s how people were supposed to do it. No, that’s how everyone did it. Except us—Mizuike had moved in with me first, and only later had I developed feelings for her. So I’d been flailing, backing away, becoming paralyzed, suffering, and squirming. You’re supposed to sip a love potion like this a little at a time, but I’d been forced to down it all at once. …What a ridiculous comparison. I’d probably only thought of it because of the sweet-and-sour apple juice I was tasting on my tongue…barely. What I was drinking tasted like water. “This isn’t juice.” What Mizuike had left me to drink was just melted ice. I sucked it up through the straw loudly, purposefully being rude to show I was annoyed. Mizuike watched me for a moment, and then she burst into laughter. “Ha-ha… Ha-ha-ha!” Her laugh was awkward, like she wasn’t used to it. Her white teeth gleamed as she laughed. The bangs that normally covered her eyes were thrown back to show her happy face. I didn’t want to let go of the straw, so I kept sucking as if I were vacuuming the bottom of the empty glass. Something had changed. A new, cozy feeling had formed between us. At least, I felt it, and as I held on tight to the glass, which had warmed up to the same temperature as my skin, I wished it would last. Come to think of it, it was the first time I’d made Mizuike laugh out loud. And maybe it would be the last. “Maybe I like summer a little after all,” I said after we left the teahouse. “Oh yeah?” Hoshi said brightly. She walked forward to stand next to me and looked up at the sky. I followed her gaze to the cloudless blue sky filled with the buzzing of cicadas. It felt strangely good to be outside, like I was enveloped in summer, like the heat was caressing me. Until I felt the sweat rolling down my neck. “No, I take that back.” “I totally get you.” We were dragging our feet on the walk back, like we were kicking invisible soccer balls in front of us with no energy to hurry home. “Too hot!” Hoshi said what I’d been thinking. She opened the door to her apartment, and we crammed inside to get out of the heat. My mother’s head popped out of the living room. She had gotten back while we’d been out. “Welcome back!” she said to us. “…Hi.” My mom quickly disappeared back into the living room, like an animal hiding in its burrow… Well, not like I wanted to talk to her anyway. Panting, Hoshi and I unloaded the shopping and put it in the fridge. Then we ran to our room and switched on the fan first thing. People who had bigger fridges didn’t need to go shopping so often, so they had more free time to enjoy life, I thought, remembering my sister’s warm smile. “I feel icky. Going to take a shower,” said Hoshi. She grabbed a change of clothes and shot out of the room. I was impressed she had the energy to run after so long in the heat. I moved from one side to the other, following the breeze from the turning fan. It was extra effort, but I’d rather do that than stop the fan from turning, because then I’d feel guilty for hogging it. I was cooling down a bit, but if I stopped too long in one place and the breeze was off me, sweat poured out of me even worse than before. Hoshi returned from the shower, dressed in fresh clothes. She sat down in front of the fan and started roughly toweling off her hair. She was treating her hair so badly, but the strands sticking out—spilling out?—from the towel shone like some special ornaments. Hoshi noticed me watching her dry her hair, and she stopped moving. “What?” “Nothing.” Did my sister like blonds? I had noticed she often commented on Hoshi’s hair. I picked up a strand of my unruly, wavy hair. The tips were kind of brown, but my hair was black. I’d never done anything special to care for my hair. If I knew for sure Shiho liked blonds, I’d dye it blond. If she said she liked blue, I’d dye it bluer than the summer sky. I had to be exactly what my sister wanted, even if it meant no longer being me. I’d throw away everything I was for my sister. “You can take a shower too, if you want,” Hoshi mumbled. “I know?” Hoshi rubbed her cheeks dry with the towel. “I mean…you’re sweaty.” “Huh? Do I smell bad?” “Look, I don’t know. I’m not coming over to sniff you, but you’re sweaty.” She hid her face in the big bath towel, drying herself off with cartoonish motions. She was bad at choosing her words… Funny coming from me, but it was the truth. She always sounded anxious, like me when I was saying good-bye to my sister. I’d always search and search for the best words to use, but I’d never find them. Being able to recognize the same trait in Hoshi gave me hope about us becoming friends at some point. She didn’t want me to be just a friend, but I could become a good friend to her, I was sure. “Okay, then… I’ll go use your bathroom.” “…’Kay,” she mumbled quietly from under the towel. Before meeting her, I had always been the one who spoke the most quietly in any house I stayed at. Hoshi was so nice. She didn’t yell at me, and she wasn’t scary. I often thought how lucky I was to have met her. But…good as it was to have drifted to peaceful waters after the tide had turned in my life, I wasn’t a fish. Someday, I’d want to get out and walk my own path. Every now and again, her eyes looked like those of a child. Granted, we were still children to a surprising extent, not-yet-fully-formed people unable to live on our own, but her eyes were far younger than her age indicated… She was like a preschooler who had yet to develop character, who had yet to have their feelings hurt. That was the impression she gave me. The dissonance between Umi Mizuike’s childlike naïveté and the acts of debauchery she’d committed with her older sister made my head spin. On the topic of her sister, I’d been sure she’d turn up the next day, as nonchalant as ever. I’d resigned myself to that unwelcome prospect. But the days had been passing, and she hadn’t shown up. The wicked woman would never do what I expected. She had told me she was leaving Mizuike in my care for a while. What was she plotting? Even if she left us alone for a while, she wouldn’t disappear for good…right? I could recognize amusement in that woman’s eyes when she was up to some mischief, but apart from that, I couldn’t work out what she was thinking. Over five days, I had been finding errands and tasks for Mizuike, having her accompany me outside to help with this or that… In other words, I did what I could to increase the amount of time we spent together. Was it working? Honestly, I couldn’t tell. Showing emotions wasn’t something Mizuike did very much. Still, I did it because I wanted to. As I watched the spinning blades of the fan, I thought about that walk back home with Mizuike, and I felt the muscles of my face form a smile. I’d had fun going out to the store with Mizuike. Whenever I glimpsed a shadow of that woman over her, my heart sank, but when we were walking down the aisles of the store together, I was happy—that was a fact. The initiative was always mine, but just having Mizuike’s company made me feel like my heart was being filled up, except not with blood but with a different kind of fuel. A smile would appear on my face, and I would feel restless. I wondered if that was what love was. Thinking about that made my head feel sweaty again, so I rubbed it more with the towel. Then Mizuike came back from her fairly quick shower, so I shuffled to the side, giving up the prime fan-breeze spot to her. It was nice to hear a little “thanks” when she crouched down next to me. A gentle, warm breeze came over me like wingbeats. Mizuike was leaning forward toward the fan to dry her long hair… And leaning forward meant… A bolt of shame hit me. I had to turn away, although I tried to be as inconspicuous as possible. Movement attracts attention; that’s how humans are. “Um, Hoshi…” Damn—she noticed. “Yeah?” “I see you staring at my breasts a lot.” Suddenly, I was so self-conscious that it was as if I were bleeding from behind my ears. “M-me? S-staring?” “You do it all the time.” “No I don’t!” I shouted in agitation, which was basically an admission of guilt. Beads of cold sweat appeared on my back. Mizuike was looking at me, her eyes shaded by the towel and the mass of her wet hair. “I’m sensitive to people’s looks. I’ve always had to be.” “R-really…” I understood she didn’t mean people’s appearances, but their stares. She’d grown up in a rough environment where attention was a threat. Anyway, I wanted to die now, and the shower I’d taken had all been for nothing because I was sweating like a pig again.
Chapter 28
22 min read